A control system may include a controller connected to a system under control. As one example, the system under control may be a mechanical or electrical system. Fault detection in a control system may be performed by periodically or continuously monitoring a command signal from the controller and one or more output signals from the system under control, and comparing the output signals to a threshold limit to determine if there is a fault in the system. However, it may be difficult to select an appropriate threshold limit that balances maximization of fault detection with minimizing false fault detections. It may further be difficult to generate output signals that accurately represent a failure response in the system in order to select the threshold limit.
In one particular example, a fault detection system may monitor command signals to the system and output signals provided by the system to detect faults in the system. In order to verify performance of the fault detection system, a fault in the system must be generated. One way to generate a fault in the system is to physically modify the system to create output signals that represent a failure response. However, physical modifications may be time consuming and costly. Further, physical modifications may permanently damage the system. Another way to generate a fault in the system is to use a computer model to simulate output signals that represent a failure response. However, simulations merely provide predicted output signals based on a given failure response and not what the actual output signal would be.
Accordingly, those skilled in the art continue with research and development efforts in the field of generating failure responses in systems under control.